


there's a place in the sun for you and your children

by Amie33



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M, Miscarriage, Stillbirth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-18
Updated: 2013-07-18
Packaged: 2017-12-20 14:30:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/888350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amie33/pseuds/Amie33
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She’s pregnant.<br/>The first time it happens, she stares at the sheet of paper the lab sent her and it takes her a few minutes to realise the test is positive. Positive. Which means she’s pregnant. A word she’s never thought would apply to her one day. It’s not even a thing she’s thought about, the concept seemed too far, too strange for her life. She didn’t even want it. She had always believed it would be impossible and she never missed it. But now it’s in front of her eyes, deep in her belly, and she doesn’t know what she’s supposed to do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	there's a place in the sun for you and your children

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is the reason why I shouldn't be allowed to write in the middle of the night... Big warning for miscarriage and stillbirth. Don't read if it makes you uncomfortable. Also I hopefully have never had to deal with it myself, my knowledge only comes from what I've read or heard. I don't pretend to understand and could only write about what I thought would be, with my own sensibility.  
>  (you can feel my lack of confidence here, can you?)
> 
> Huge thanks to Claudia for the beta.
> 
> Title from How it ends, DeVotchka

She’s pregnant.

The first time it happens, she stares at the sheet of paper the lab sent her and it takes her a few minutes to realise the test is positive. Positive. Which means she’s pregnant. A word she’s never thought would apply to her one day. It’s not even a thing she’s thought about, the concept seemed too far, too strange for her life. She didn’t even want it. She had always believed it would be impossible and she never missed it. But now it’s in front of her eyes, deep in her belly, and she doesn’t know what she’s supposed to do.

It finally hits her the day after that, twenty-four hours for her brain to finally realise what’s happening, and she laughs and laughs of joy until she’s out of breath.

She’s pregnant.

She tells the Doctor the next time he appears, but he doesn’t react the way she’s expected. He freezes, and if he manages to smile, she knows there’s something wrong - she also knows him too much to ask what’s the matter. He pretends to be happy with her, but it’s like all his joy is forced, fake. She thinks it’s because of his past, of the children he once had and who now are lost.

She understand, a few weeks after. She wakes up one morning with the sensation that something is wrong, and when she stands up she can feel something hot and wet slipping down her legs. “No, no, no.” She rushes to the bathroom and closes her eyes as she removes her shorts, but she doesn’t need to see it to know; she’s bleeding.

The next time she meets the Doctor she slaps him, hard. He groans and strokes the cheek she has just hit as he asks. “What was that for?” He sounds like everything is usual, and it makes her want to slap him more; she fists her hands, nails digging into her skin not to.

“You should have told me.”

“Told you what?”

“That he wouldn’t live.”

The Doctor’s face crumbles, and she knows that he understands what she’s talking about.

“It was a boy?” he finally murmurs, his voice broken and she bites her lip to stop the tears that threaten to appear in her eyes. She won’t cry. She’s already lost so many things, she can’t let her dignity go.

“He was.”

He looks at her with pain, and she suddenly feels even more cross. He doesn’t understand, he can’t understand. She didn’t tell him the details, he can’t imagine what it was. And she won’t tell him; she doesn’t want to. She wants to forget and never lives that again. Never.

He hugs her, holds her for long minutes, and she gradually relaxes in his arms. It’s not his fault, it’s not hers. Genetics they said. Often happens, so early in the pregnancy.

It’s better this way.

x.

The second time, it’s her fault. She isn’t as careful as she’s supposed to be. She’s been tired, the baby causing her awful headaches and the morning sickness are insufferable - when you spend most of your time in a time machine, it’s morning almost all day long, or so it seems to her. The Doctor is always around her, taking care of her, and she’s thankful to him. But she can’t stay all day long in her room, throwing up and feeling miserable. So when she feels a bit better, they land the Tardis in a planet or another and go out.

They shouldn’t have.

She should have thought. She should have stopped before it was too late. But she can never resist a bit of fun, and it wasn’t supposed to end that way. Now she thinks about it and she knows she will never forget herself for being so childish and giving in to temptation. People to save, an endless war, guns...

She gets shot.

The Doctor is within her in a second, his screams barely audible as explosions shake the ground and bullets fly around them (for a second she’s afraid he’s going to be shot too, and she wouldn’t survive losing him). His hands are on her stomach, a large stain of blood forming on her shirt. It hurts, but she doesn’t feel the pain, there is too much adrenaline in her veins, too much fear. “The baby,” she repeats again and again when he asks her how she feels. “The baby.”

She can see the light coming out of his hand as he begins to heal her, but she faints.

When she opens her eyes again she’s lying on their bed in the Tardis. It feels warm and safe, but she knows. The Doctor is sitting next to the bed, elbows on his knees, his face hidden between his hands. There is still blood and mud on his shirt, sleeves up around his arms, and she gulps.

He lifts his head when he realises she’s awake, but doesn’t smile at her as he would usually do. Instead his eyes only shows pain and she breathes in deeply.

“The baby?” she asks, one more time, one last time, even if the question is useless.

“I couldn’t do anything. I’m sorry.”

She shakes her head and looks away from him. He did what he could. It’s her fault. It’s her entire fault.

x.

The third time, she doesn’t understand. Neither does the Doctor. He feels helpless, and she feels... she isn’t sure she can even feel anything anymore.

It was great. She was careful. The morning sickness came and went fast. She felt better. She felt good. Her body was changing, rounder and curver, and she liked it. After the two attempts that couldn’t go very far, she was happy to really _feel_ pregnant for the first time. Even the weight was welcome, because it meant the baby was growing, getting stronger.

She could feel him move - a boy, it was a boy again. She talked to him, made him listen to music. The Doctor put his hands on her stomach and told him fairytales.They argued about name. They made the Tardis create a few rooms for him, bought toys and clothes. They were happy. A family, for the first time of her life.

And then the nightmare.

It started with a sudden pain, low in her stomach that made her break in two before snapping around her hips and back. And it didn’t stop, getting worse and worse. It wasn’t normal. It was too soon, too late. She was at six months, there was still so much time. It couldn’t be now.

But it was, and there was nothing they could do to prevent it. They tried to stop it, tried to find a way. When the Tardis couldn’t help them, they landed in the best hospital of the universe, asked for the best doctor, the best nurses, only to hear what they already knew, what they had feared.

There was nothing to do.

After long and painful hours, the baby is born. But born isn’t the right word, as he doesn’t cry. He doesn’t breathe. He doesn’t move. They will never see his eyes open. He will never discover the world with them, run with them. His rooms will stay empty for ever. He will never play with the toys they had for him. He will never even have a name - she doesn’t want to. She refuses to. Giving him a name would be accepting what happened, and she never will be able to.

They are given a box, so little it’s easy to imagine there’s nothing - no one - in it. They burn it, and open the Tardis in middle of space to scatter the ashes where they belong. Or the Doctor does, because she can’t. She watches a few feet away from the door as the remaining part of their child, their son, and all the dreams they’ve had vanished into the void. She can see her husband cry, but she refuses to; her eyes are, and will remain dry.

x.

After that, she runs off of the Tardis. She can’t bear to stay, not with all the memories that keep coming back to her, not with the Doctor looking at her like she may break in two - or as he may break instead. She doesn’t want his pity. She doesn’t want his pain. Sometimes, it’s good to have someone to share a hard situation with, but this time it’s not the case. She wants to be alone. When the Doctor is around she just wants to punch him and shake him until he smiles and pretends everything’s alright, like he usually does. But when he does smile and pretend everything’s alright, she wants to punch him even more. It’s not sane. If she stays they will tear apart and destroy each other, and she doesn’t want that. She can’t lose him too, and he doesn’t deserve this, her, in this state.

So one day she packs her things and leaves the Tardis. The Doctor is nowhere to be seen, and she’s glad she doesn’t have to face him as she sneaks out.

She runs, as she has learnt to do. She runs and runs and runs. She works a bit, digs in sand and empty cities, but it doesn’t last long. She finds too many corpses, too many dead bodies. It reminds her too many things.

So she runs farther, faster. She meets people, she saves lives. It helps her a bit. She doesn’t know why the universe has taken her her children, three times now, but sometimes she thinks it’s because she has killed too many times, and she hopes that maybe if she saves enough people, the universe will forgive her. But she doesn’t want another chance, she prays not to have another chance. She feels like she won’t be able to carry another child now, not after what happened.

Sometimes she meets the Doctor, and she thanks the Tardis and the gods that she never meets a Doctor who knows. He doesn’t ask anything. He makes her laugh, he makes her smile. He asks questions though, not clearly, but she can hear them, in the way he looks at her. She doesn’t eat much. She doesn’t sleep much. She hides her body, the body she hates, the body that betrayed her, under large shirts and horrible baggy pants. Her laughter sounds false, and it is. Sometimes, he tries to touch her, to kiss her, and she always backs away. She can’t have his hands on her, not now. It’s too soon.

She doesn’t know how much time passes; she loses the count of days, weeks, months - years? She doesn’t know, and she doesn’t want to know.

After a while she feels better. It’s not really better at first, just not as bad as it used to be. The holes in her hearts seem lesser. Some of the memories vanish, feel less vivid. Once she surprises herself to smile in a mirror, and she suddenly realises how she’s changed. She looks like a ghost, and she feels like a ghost; empty, transparent, hollow. And it’s not what she wants to be anymore.

She gathers her things and makes a big fire in the middle of the desert, on some dusty planet which name she can’t remember. She puts everything in the burning flames, clothes, books, even some pages of her diary. She needs to forget. She needs a new start. The fire will do very well. It’s like a regeneration, and it’s what she needs - but she can’t regenerate, she will never be able to, so instead she burns everything, and she feels better.

x.

She eventually meets a Doctor who knows, but it doesn’t hurt as much as she thought it would. She takes his hand, and he cups her face, both feeling the same pain but this time it’s good to share it. They have been grieving, both of them, and now they are both ready to live with the reality of what happened - not accept it, never.

He kisses her, and she kisses him, and for the first time in ages she lets him touch her, and he makes love to her, and it hurts, and it feels good. It’s like coming home, everything seems new but old, different but familiar. His kisses have the same taste, but the passion is different. Deeper. And she knows it’s because they have the same scars graved on their hearts.

x.

The fourth time, she refuses it.

She doesn’t want it. She doesn’t want to go through all again. She won’t be able to. She’s afraid. She thinks the best would be to stop it, right now. But the Doctor shushes her, and finds the words, and he persuades her to try. One more time.

He is right.

She goes through all the forty-two weeks (and a few days more) without any incident. The labour isn’t pleasurable, but it doesn’t feel cold and painful as the previous time. The Doctor holds her hand all along, and when he squeezes her this time, it’s a good sign. Still she’s afraid, until the last second, when finally the baby’s here, crying, squirming. Breathing.

Her whole body shakes with emotion.

It takes a few seconds to clean it up and makes it presentable, and finally, _finally_ , she holds her baby. It’s a boy, again. But he’s strong and safe, alive, and she swears she can see him smile as she first lays her eyes on him and he looks back at her with curiosity. The Doctor’s hand presses against her back as he leans in, his other hand resting against hers on the baby’s back as he speaks. “Hello.”

She knows he’s grinning, she imagines the joy on his face but she can’t see anything.

Eventually, she allows herself to cry.

 


End file.
